All posts tagged Stories

09/21/2014

I’m definitely a little late on posting these photos, but a few weeks ago I took a little last-minute solo journey to check out Hong Kong. Being so busy all summer long, I managed to take a week off before the fall (our super busy season) starts up and get out of Shanghai for a bit.

After securing a fairly cheap round-trip flight and booking a room in Causeway Bay, I was only 48 hours away from one of my best 72-hour vacations to date. Most people who visit Hong Kong for such a short period do so for visa renewals; I was just late on figuring out what to do with my week off. Oops, silly me. My trip was purely for pleasure.

I wanted to do so much during my visit, but didn’t want to bite off more than I could chew. I had plans of checking out bike shops too but just ran out of time. Next visit, I’m definitely going to go see Brian at RDFX and hopefully find someone/somewhere to lend me a bike for a few days and get a real feel for the city. Though even just being in HK for 3 days, I managed to squeeze quite a bit in and even made a few new friends.

06/25/2012

Ezra Caldwell of Fast Boy Cycles just posted up a great story, recounting his week of looking after his 8 year-old nephew while simultaneously building the kid a bike. “Hey.. uncle Ezra.. What if this thing was a bazoooka and it had knives attached to it and…”. It’s a great story, and really reminds me of visiting bike shops as a youngin’. Head over to the Fast Boy Blog for the whole story, Gunnar’s sure gonna have the coolest bike on the block!

05/29/2012

I really hope everyone had the chance to spend some time in the saddle this weekend. The weather in Vermont was absolutely perfect, making for a perfect weekend to get out of town and do some camping. Saturday morning I loaded up the Soma Saga with a couple panniers and with my Slumberjack tent and Hunt and I headed south. We were on a mission get to Mayfest, an annual outdoor party about 30 miles south of Burlington and wanted to get there early for beer and hot dogs.

We left Burlington around noon, which put us in for some heat and high sun. I wore my new Search and State jersey and kept surprisingly cool, especially it being all black, though I did apply sunscreen for the first time in a while – so that definitely played a part. I highly recommend wearing some if you don’t already, especially if you get late starts like us. The ride was just shy of 27 miles, mostly dirt and had a fair amount of climbing for the distance (about 2050 feet) making me really feel the extra weight I was carrying – but in a good way. I’m really happy with how the Saga handles (pictured below). This was my first time running some real weight and the 26″ wheels felt incredibly stable, even at high speeds and on dirt/gravel descents. I just need to remember not to take turns too sharp, I nearly laid my one pannier out hanging a hard right.

After getting back on to some pavement, we made a quick stop for some snacks and a cola and then rolled back onto dirt for the last 7 miles. Upon arriving, I downed a quick beer and dog and started scoping potential grounds in the tent city. The tent went up quickly, and before I knew it the kegs were tapped, music was going, there was some heavy barbecuing, a large pallet fire, and eventually some live music. Didn’t snap any party photos, I never trust myself with nice things (cameras) in these situations. Check out a few photos I did manage to grab below. Hope everyone had a great weekend, any tales of good weekend riding?

03/12/2012

I would like to take a moment to thank Krissy for her not-needed, but extremely generous and much appreciated gift she gave to Hunt and me. About a year ago we were driving through the North End and saw someone riding a Surly Cross-check of which was reported stolen to us at the shop earlier that week. I hate bike thieves and so does Hunt.

We whipped the car right in front of the guy riding the Surly and confronted him about the bike. Apparently he “bought it for fifty bucks” and was “gonna need that cash”. “Ha-ha and LoL” were our responses; essentially. We told him we’d run it by the police and check the stolen bike log, and that if he wanted to come by the shop to verify ownership, he was completely free to do so. He didn’t want much to do with the bike anymore all of a sudden.

So long story short, we reunited Krissy with her long lost friend and were rewarded with the headiest dozen of bombers (beer, fool) available. I’m currently drinking one that’ll be this week’s brew review. Thank you so much Krissy for the card and beers. Honestly, we just hate seeing bikes go missing and can sympathize with the feeling of loss. We have the same relationships with our bikes and the more I’d hear about bikes being stolen when I was working at the shop, the more intense my locking strategy would get.

01/10/2011

“This article first appeared in New York Magazine in the early 1970s. Thanks to Jim Langley for the text.

BEHOLD THUNDERTHIGHS! Slicing noiseless through the frigid park, uncluttered, kinetic, shoulders low and chin jutting (or vice versa), held off the unforgiving pavement by a hand-tooled chrome coat hanger with the merest hint of wheels, he seeks satori in the slightly gritty wind.

It’s Bikeman, soft-hat hero, champion of clean air, quietude and motorless machismo. And his time has arrived. He is Homo sapiens at peace with the machine. Pollution-free transportation is his, in its purest form: superbike, bella machina, hobby horse of the gods, the perfect evocation of Italian finesse a few pounds heavier than a Gucci moccasin, eleven gears more than a Ferrari, as starkly beautiful as a Giacometti torso. See what it does to him! Under a little housepainter hat stenciled with mythic names, his eyes are slits of distilled concentration. His hands, in little gloves with holes that drive women mad, rest cat-like on the handlebars, ready to spring forward in a trice to the brakes. His legs? Veritable pistons. The discipline of the samurai pales. The machine cost Bikeman more than $300, and any fool can see it has made him different.”